Schroder's Win: By The Numbers

Republican and former state representative John Schroder has been elected Louisiana Treasurer, with less than 13 percent of all registered voters actually participating. Political analyst John Couvillon says that clearly affected Schroder’s margin of victory.

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"Turnout patterns statewide contributed to the race being a bit less of a blowout than was normally thought to be the case in a race like this," says the pollster and political data analyst.

In addition, Couvillon says he found there was a change from the typical voting patterns based on race.

"In the remaining 63 parishes, black turnout was up two percent. Turnout in predominately white precincts was up four percent in Orleans Parish, but down 16 percent in the other 63 parishes," he explains. "Those factors made the race slightly closer than it would normally have been expected to be."

Couvillon cautions against reading too much into this analysis, especially when it comes to future election predictions.

"The turnout was so low, that when you're talking turnout approaching 10 percent, the slightest changes in anything can have an oversized impact."

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It’s hard to tell what aggravates Louisiana Secretary of State Tom Schedler more: The expected low turnout for tomorrow’s statewide election, or the cost of holding it.

“It costs $6 million here in Louisiana to run a statewide election,” Schedler said, speaking on C-Span last week. "It costs me the same amount of money to run a presidential election at close to 70 percent voter turnout as it will cost me to have a 12 percent voter turnout."

Less than 14-percent of Louisiana’s three million registered voters cast ballots in Saturday’s statewide election, but they sent the Treasurer’s race to a runoff next month between Democrat Derrick Edwards and Republican John Schroder.